SBC Overwhelming in affirmation of Dr McKissic's resolution

[Dave Roberts]

I find two things here. First, I do applaud the SBC for moving into racial reconciliation as a goal. This move would have done wonders for Baptist pastors in the South in the 1950's and 60's who were being fired "for being liberal on race." The history is still difficult to clean up as many strong SBC churches were the local base for the White Citizens Council, an organization dedicated to resisting integration. It's interesting that the denomination is integrating, but most of its local churches are having a hard time with this. CBF also struggles with the same reality, perhaps having a larger percentage of churches with integrated and diverse ministries but still struggling to reach into minority communities.

Second, the decline of SBC churches across the South, is the continuation of the demographic trend that was cited as reason for the takeover/resurgence. "Moderate conservatives" didn't have the strength to evangelize in a new context as did "fundamental conservatives," according to the Peace Committee's language. The truth is that neither group has found the answer to effective evangelism in the changing culture, and the old SBC culture died in the 1970's, that culture of support for churches and Christian values from the broader society. Both CBF and the SBC do fairly well in the cities, but the smaller cities and towns are often a wasteland of churches still looking to clone the great pastor or bring back the kind of church they had in the 1950's and 60's.

It's also going to be interesting to see how the Donald Trump style of rhetoric will affect the SBC. I'm already aware that his strength is a lot of traditional Baptists (not SBC leaders but pew-sitters) who are welcoming the xenophobic and racist comments that are there. I wonder how the SBC statements will play in Trump's southern state strongholds. Any thoughts?

[Stephen Fox]

Brings some much needed perspective to the Poles of myself on one hand, and Thornton and Sandy on the other.

I am glad he stil participates among the barbarians on this board.

[Stephen Fox]

I'm willing to bet if some fundamentalist preacher hadn't brought up the word "inerrancy" some years ago the lay people wouldn't be demanding that anyone believe it because they'd have never heard of it.

I applaud the SBC's move to more diverse churches. I hope that diversity will move its way up to leadership.

That's been my point, without the Bircher White citizen council mentality resentments of McAteer,Pressler and Helms and Albert Lee Smith and like minded coupled with Paige Patterson and Criswell and AdrianRogers wantin control, not to mention Jimmy Carter's taxes on Oil that hit Pressler and his world squarely in the pocket, the concept of Inerrancy wouldn'ta metastasized into the cancer it became.

It was a trick on white people to paraphrase Flannery O Connor.

Frank Graham's son preached at FBC Spartanburg last year as a card carrying ordained Baptist preacher. Sandy again cherrypicked an anomaly that may not even be true. And And Graham Lotz, bless her heart has turned into a parody of SNL's Church lady.

[William Thornton]

Well...there you go again with a nonsensical foray into the 50s nd 60s. The current year, stephen, is 2016. Obama is president. Hil is likely his successor. Gay marriage is legal. George Wallace is dead. I interact with black SBC pastors almost every day.

Join a good church and get up to date on church life.

[Sandy]

Second, the decline of SBC churches across the South, is the continuation of the demographic trend that was cited as reason for the takeover/resurgence. "Moderate conservatives" didn't have the strength to evangelize in a new context as did "fundamental conservatives," according to the Peace Committee's language. The truth is that neither group has found the answer to effective evangelism in the changing culture, and the old SBC culture died in the 1970's, that culture of support for churches and Christian values from the broader society. Both CBF and the SBC do fairly well in the cities, but the smaller cities and towns are often a wasteland of churches still looking to clone the great pastor or bring back the kind of church they had in the 1950's and 60's.

The independent and autonomous nature of Baptist churches means that evangelistic efforts within the denomination are largely dependent on what each local church does. Most SBC churches are small town, larger town, suburban and rural, especially across the South. Evangelism is hit and miss, depending on the church, mostly miss. There are churches here and there that are evangelistic, but for the most part, they are like what you describe, longing for the good ole days when brother so and so was here and we had to put chairs in the aisles, and so on. But if you look at growth rates and per capita percentages, there is a lot of evangelism happening in many places. I've had the opportunity to see what is happening here in greater Pittsburgh, and in Philadelphia among Southern Baptists, and the percentages and numbers of baptisms, comparatively, is sky high, as is church growth. But the total numbers are much smaller, and certainly lower than the rate of attrition due to deaths and departures in the larger and more numerous churches in the south. And it will be that way for some time to come.

CBF has some similar issues, I'm sure. I know at lot of CBF congregations are much like the one we belonged to for 12 years in Houston. It was in a transitional urban setting, a neighborhood that had gone from families and working people, to nearly ghetto, through gentrification and into an urban business and shopping district with a very diverse population. It went from a traditional Baptist congregation with about 1,700 in attendance in the 70's, to about 800 in worship currently, with about 200 of those being in ethnic, or language congregations that meet in the building, but separately from the main congregation. With the exception of the ethnic churches, it has maintained its more traditional worship format, centered on pulpit oratory, at least, until recently. It did help birth a "Gen X" congregation in its building that now meets about 15 blocks away, though it is SBC, not CBF, it is now the larger of the two. It's tough to re-establish evangelistic outreach in the more traditional type of churches that make up the bulk of CBF.

[Stephen Fox]

Affirmed by one of the leading analysts of religion in America today, Paul Harvey, in the high eschelon with Randall Balmer, Steven Miller and Mark Noll.

Harvey is the author of one of the best books Ive read in the last seven years, Moses Jesus and the Trickster.

Related to this board I think it is fair to say he comes down on the side of Dave Roberts.

Their key insight is to explore in real politik how the SBC has found a way to lean toward Trump with Richard Land and Eric Metaxas at the same time recognizing that SBC takeover gave rise to this Trump moment.

Interesting piece Im sure Thornton and Sandy will find fault with, but I hope they are better than Jerry Vines in conceding it well worth their deliberation

http://religiondispatches.org/baptist-r ... lture-war/

[Sandy]

Certainly convention leaders have made some notable moves: dissing Donald Trump on Twitter, expressing dismay at the support of Trump by evangelical writers such as Eric Metaxas (author of a recent, deeply flawed book that “explores the forgotten connections between faith-based virtues and the survival of freedom in America”), and avoiding the blatantly homophobic proclamations of the past.

Hmm. Almost exactly the opposite of what you said, Stephen.

[Stephen Fox]

Moreover, even the #NeverTrump stance of convention leaders is paired with, in effect, a de facto #NeverHillary position. In this view, both are “evils,” and there’s not a lesser of two evils. It’s as if this is an election between Darth Vader and Chancellor Palpatine. This draws a moral equivalency between a fairly conventional centrist politician (with some Methodist civic gospel leanings) and a dangerous demagogue.

That is perhaps an improvement over the position of many Republican leaders (which is, in effect, he may be the antichrist, but he can help with our agenda and anyway Hillary is worse), and a step back from the worst days of the culture wars. But it has yet to embrace the most inclusive design for American democracy, and has not yet found a political vision beyond the imbalanced equation that #NeverTrump also equals #NeverHillary.

And as for Harvey's take on Pressler, Helms, Albert Lee Smith and other takeover artists, I can't remember ever reading an analysis from him that differed much from the conclusion of Randall Balmer and myself and Bill Moyers, the Birch mentality of of that inner passionate circle was a driving force of the takeover masquerading under the disguise of a fight over inerrancy to paraphrase Harold Bloom. And as I linked in Baptist history in the Extremists thread to that end it mirrored Pressler's like minded soul in the Lutheran Mo. Synod Mr. Otten.

[Sandy]

It's also going to be interesting to see how the Donald Trump style of rhetoric will affect the SBC. I'm already aware that his strength is a lot of traditional Baptists (not SBC leaders but pew-sitters) who are welcoming the xenophobic and racist comments that are there. I wonder how the SBC statements will play in Trump's southern state strongholds. Any thoughts?

I'd guess you are right about some Baptists in the pew. I've seen a few snarky comments about the convention's resolution on the confederate flag indicating some people may leave their church, or at least make that statement on a message board. Likewise, there will certainly be support for Trump and for his racist views as well, from within individual, local congregations. There are probably a few SBC churches that hold similar doctrine to the extremist pastor in Sacramento, and the guy in Arizona, who think that what happened in Orlando was God's judgment. I wouldn't say it's a majority, or even close to it.

Change doesn't come quickly, especially in Christian denominations. Much of what is changing in the SBC, aside from the leadership, is actually rooted in their belief in inerrancy and infallibility. It's hard not to push for racial reconciliation if you are also taking a high view of scripture. Likewise, there's no denying that what the Confederate flag originally stood for trumps any other symbolism that might be attached to it by the culture later on. But the SBC's view on same-gender marriage is also rooted in that same theological perspective, which is why it's not going to change, and outsiders like Harvey, Worthen, Wuthnow, Balmer, et al, ad nauseam, can't seem to figure it out. The dichotomy that Harvey sees while scratching his head over it would suggest that inerrancy really was the issue, as 30 plus years since would clearly indicate, and the conservative politics developed as a result.

[Dave Roberts]

I'd guess you are right about some Baptists in the pew. I've seen a few snarky comments about the convention's resolution on the confederate flag indicating some people may leave their church, or at least make that statement on a message board. Likewise, there will certainly be support for Trump and for his racist views as well, from within individual, local congregations. There are probably a few SBC churches that hold similar doctrine to the extremist pastor in Sacramento, and the guy in Arizona, who think that what happened in Orlando was God's judgment. I wouldn't say it's a majority, or even close to it.

Change doesn't come quickly, especially in Christian denominations. Much of what is changing in the SBC, aside from the leadership, is actually rooted in their belief in inerrancy and infallibility. It's hard not to push for racial reconciliation if you are also taking a high view of scripture. Likewise, there's no denying that what the Confederate flag originally stood for trumps any other symbolism that might be attached to it by the culture later on. But the SBC's view on same-gender marriage is also rooted in that same theological perspective, which is why it's not going to change, and outsiders like Harvey, Worthen, Wuthnow, Balmer, et al, ad nauseam, can't seem to figure it out. The dichotomy that Harvey sees while scratching his head over it would suggest that inerrancy really was the issue, as 30 plus years since would clearly indicate, and the conservative politics developed as a result.

Sandy, I am very aware of what an old preacher told me many years ago He said, "Baptists believe the Bible cover to cover, just as long as they can keep it covered." What the folks in the pews believe has never matched what the leaders believe.

[Tim Bonney]

Sandy, I am very aware of what an old preacher told me many years ago He said, "Baptists believe the Bible cover to cover, just as long as they can keep it covered." What the folks in the pews believe has never matched what the leaders believe.

And is that how Baptist decide what to believe? The pastor is to preach whatever the people in the pews believe?

[Stephen Fox]

Senator Lankford from Oklahoma a patsy of the NRA assuming key role in SBC's ongoing alignment with the FAR Right. Pressler has to be ecstatic about what he has wrought even without a microphone. Criswell lives on in full glory.

http://www.ethicsdaily.com/southern-bap ... -cms-23490

[Dave Roberts]

Sandy, I am very aware of what an old preacher told me many years ago He said, "Baptists believe the Bible cover to cover, just as long as they can keep it covered." What the folks in the pews believe has never matched what the leaders believe.

And is that how Baptist decide what to believe? The pastor is to preach whatever the people in the pews believe?

Of course it is. How else does a pastor keep his pulpit?

[Sandy]

Senator Lankford from Oklahoma a patsy of the NRA assuming key role in SBC's ongoing alignment with the FAR Right. Pressler has to be ecstatic about what he has wrought even without a microphone. Criswell lives on in full glory.

http://www.ethicsdaily.com/southern-bap ... -cms-23490

Interesting read. Even MSNBC has noticed the distance between conservative evangelicals and Donald Trump, and a couple of their commentators, Steve Kornacki and Chris Hayes, mentioned the SBC as being a bit on the lukewarm side, from a political perspective as it relates to Trump's campaign. But of course, Ethics Daily is completely and totally unbiased in its perspective on things SBC, as is Brian Kaylor, right?

I keep hearing evangelicals, Ted Cruz, and now Jack Graham, insist that millions of them stayed home in 2012. But all of the polling data suggests that Evangelical conservatives supported Mit Romney at a level that no one else has achieved. I think part of the problem is that when they count numbers, they count about 95% for whoever the Republican candidate is, but in fact, about 35% of Evangelicals voted for Obama in 2012. That could explain why they didn't see what they expected in Romney's vote total.

[Stephen Fox]

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc ... rs/488114/

Land Rebounds, still the heart of the Takeover

Ronnie Floyd as big a Lackey as he ever was

[Tim Bonney]

Of course it is. How else does a pastor keep his pulpit?

[Stephen Fox]

Following is a quote from a Devon Noll in response to a piece at religiondispatches that reminded folks it was fundies in the pew in Alabama and South Carolina in strategic primary states that brought us to this Trump moment

I first want to say that I have a real problem with Evangelicals/Pentecostals/Fundamentalists and the way they interpret the teachings of Jesus. They all seem to be determined that we should live by laws that were written thousands of years ago by two men (not God), and then follow the teachings of a man who did not know Jesus and a "prophet" what was living in isolation and exile after being declared a heretic by the early Christian church. They seem to have skipped the four Gospels or they would not be supporting a party that puts greed above all else, torture and war as objectives, and denying the poor, elderly, and children of this nation food, housing, and medical care. This group of religious zealots, and yes that is what they are, has taken over a political party to further an agenda that is nothing more than "Me First" and the rest can go die somewhere, not Christian values. If they were real Christians, they would be embracing the social justice and charity that the Democrats sometimes embrace more readily than the GOP because it is what Jesus would do (he was after all a liberal for his times).

Trump plays to this mindset because he shares it, whether he goes to church or not, and they go for it like fish to bait. This group of zealots like to hear him spout off and if he is not morally upstanding, well, truthfully neither are they. When you consider the number of scandals among conservative and Evangelical leaders over the last two decades, their demanding moral purity from a candidate is somewhat hypocritical, so by supporting a candidate that is anything but, they assuage their own consciences. Trump is as much a result of politics and religion mixing as Ted Cruz is or Marco Rubio is. When you have a mixing of church and state, and that is what this is, you get the kind of lunacy that drives nations into civil war or revolution. It is part of what led to our American Revolution and it is why freedom of religion is part of our Constitution. Our Forefathers were not always the wisest of men, but they seemed to foresee this day in our political lives, and so they did not support any one religion over another, but gave us freedom to choose. This is a freedom that people like Trump and the Religious Right would deny to everyone. It is why creatures like Trump, Cruz, or Ryan are so dangerous to this nation and why the Evangelical Movement just as dangerous. It is why they work together to within the GOP, and it why the Evangelical Movement can be held as guilty as the Tea Party for the rise of Trump. They cannot try to put the genie back in the bottle when all they wanted was to break the bottle to begin with.

[John Sneed]

Let me say at the start, I don't care one way or the other about the Confederate flag per se. I had ancestors on both sides of the Civil War. My father was from Virginia down in the hills near the Tennessee border. My mother's family were railroad people from Pennsylvania.
But since the shooting in Charleston there has been a concerted effort (mostly coming from the left) to erase completely and vestige of southern history. Signs of it are all over, from South Carolina, to Georgia, to Mississippi and elsewhere, it is like the political mindset is to erase southern history and pretend it did not happen.
History is meant for us to learn from. Erasing history and pretending it did not happen benefits no one.
To me, this amendment is just one more piece in the overall puzzle to erase the South from the national memory. And that is all I have to say about that (apologies to Forest Gump).

[Sandy]

Let me say at the start, I don't care one way or the other about the Confederate flag per se. I had ancestors on both sides of the Civil War. My father was from Virginia down in the hills near the Tennessee border. My mother's family were railroad people from Pennsylvania.
But since the shooting in Charleston there has been a concerted effort (mostly coming from the left) to erase completely and vestige of southern history. Signs of it are all over, from South Carolina, to Georgia, to Mississippi and elsewhere, it is like the political mindset is to erase southern history and pretend it did not happen.
History is meant for us to learn from. Erasing history and pretending it did not happen benefits no one.
To me, this amendment is just one more piece in the overall puzzle to erase the South from the national memory. And that is all I have to say about that (apologies to Forest Gump).

What's happened over the years since the Civil War, and since the federal government made some choices about which battles were worth fighting, is that the Confederate flag has become associated with all kinds of legend and culture related to the Antebellum South, and the Civil War, most of it revised or redacted by memories that fade over time, most of it mixed with the hard feelings of defeat, and the false perspective of the South's prior glory. Fact is, the confederate flag was a symbol of what all other national flags symbolize, the government for whom it flies, and its foundational principles. The Confederacy leaders declared their belief in the inferiority of the negro race, something they believed relegated them to the role of slaves. It's leaders clearly stated that position, it was written into the foundational documents of the confederacy, and its vice president even bragged about being one of the first nations on the face of the earth to do this right. ANd that's all it stands for, nothing else, so you and everyone else who mentions it can stop worrying about your relatives who fought on both sides, especiallly those who fought for the South. All that culture crap is just romanticizing and idealizing some of the most unChristlike, valueless individuals and ideas that ever existed in this country. It should be outlawed.

[Stephen Fox]

Robert E Lee among them and a lot of poor Baptist farmers who fought because the "Yankees were down Here". Im glad my Great grandfather who is buried a mile from my house in Bama, fought with the Union as did Judge Frank Johnson's grandfather.

The Flag got revitalized and put back up on state capitols in late 50s and early 60s as resentment to Brown V Board of Education.

The Sad thing now is best I can figger Sandy and his friends in the SBC can't bring themselves to see what the NRA is now, which in effect is the latest Confederate Flag. The Flag and race baiting has morphed into support for the NRA and Assault Weapons and the SBC is no further along in standing against it than they were in the early 60s when the Confederate Flag went back up the flagpoles.

That is a legacy of the fundamentalist takeover of the SBC; same song different verse. Foy Valentine minus Pressler and Helms and my litany, would have the SBC at a different place now re assault weapons and the NRA. but as it is the leadership--see the rally to Trump's side-- is still in the woodshed with Joe McCarthy .

waiting on Ike to come give em a spanking

Also google Hal Crowther, The New Mind of the South, Oxford American.

[Tim Bonney]

All that culture crap is just romanticizing and idealizing some of the most unChristlike, valueless individuals and ideas that ever existed in this country. It should be outlawed.

Agreed though I don't know about outlawed for private citizens (free speech you know). But it shouldn't be flying on any government facility in the US.

[Stephen Fox]

stumbled across it today at Barnes and Noble near Rome Georgia. Houses of the Civil War.

The home of Stephens, the LT Gov of the Confederacy in Crawford Co Ga. His story is fascinating breaks several ways in Sandy analysis of the legacy of the Lost Cause

Thornton will like it too

[William Thornton]

stumbled across it today at Barnes and Noble near Rome Georgia. Houses of the Civil War.

The home of Stephens, the LT Gov of the Confederacy in Crawford Co Ga. His story is fascinating breaks several ways in Sandy analysis of the legacy of the Lost Cause

Thornton will like it too

CSA VP. Not lt gov. His statue is in the Capitol statuary hall. Virulent racist. Sickly dude...at times weighed under 100 pounds.

[Stephen Fox]

virulent racist didn't come across in the book. Man of his times but wanted to stay in Union till push came to shove.More like Rob.ert E Lee than John Calhoun from the book though he, Stephens did believe in slavery Unlike Tom Watson in his later years Stephens appears to have some redeeming qualities, as did Jeff Davis wife according to Cokie Roberts.

[Sandy]

Robert E Lee among them and a lot of poor Baptist farmers who fought because the "Yankees were down Here". Im glad my Great grandfather who is buried a mile from my house in Bama, fought with the Union as did Judge Frank Johnson's grandfather.

The Flag got revitalized and put back up on state capitols in late 50s and early 60s as resentment to Brown V Board of Education.

The Sad thing now is best I can figger Sandy and his friends in the SBC can't bring themselves to see what the NRA is now, which in effect is the latest Confederate Flag. The Flag and race baiting has morphed into support for the NRA and Assault Weapons and the SBC is no further along in standing against it than they were in the early 60s when the Confederate Flag went back up the flagpoles.

That is a legacy of the fundamentalist takeover of the SBC; same song different verse. Foy Valentine minus Pressler and Helms and my litany, would have the SBC at a different place now re assault weapons and the NRA. but as it is the leadership--see the rally to Trump's side-- is still in the woodshed with Joe McCarthy .

waiting on Ike to come give em a spanking

Also google Hal Crowther, The New Mind of the South, Oxford American.

Well, I have to hand it to you, Stephen, your creativity and imagination can create fantasy where no one else would ever see even a remote connection. You've moved from connecting blame for the rise of Donald Trump to Paul Pressler and the fundamentalist takover of the SBC, to blaming the NRA for the use of the confederate flag which somehow lead to the fundamentalist takeover of the SBC. You could have a career in fantasy writing.